Michael (né Marvin) Lee Aday, a.k.a. Meat Loaf, is an American singer and actor best known for his 1977 album Bat Out of Hell and its two "sequels". With the assistance of songwriter/producer Jim Steinman, Meat Loaf's bombastic, Wagnerian style made a huge splash on the genre and paved the way for many arena rock bands to follow.

Born in Texas on September 27, 1947, Meat Loaf dabbled in musical theatre from an early age. When he received a draft notice in 1967, he tore it up, stole his father's credit card, and moved to California to break into the music industry. During the early '70s he made several forays into stardom - he performed in several small-time bands, released a duets album with Stoney Murphy which largely went under the radar, sang lead on Ted Nugent's Free-For-All album, and performed in touring productions of Hair and The Rocky Horror Show, landing a role in the film version of the latter. His big break was to come while performing in an off-Broadway show called More Than You Deserve, when he befriended its writer Jim Steinman. Steinman had been toying with a sci-fi Rock Opera adaptation of Peter Pan and saw Meat Loaf as ideal for the lead role in it. Though the project, called Neverland, didn't come to fruition until forty years later (in a much altered form, as Bat Out of Hell: The Musical), the songs Steinman wrote for it became the genesis of Bat Out of Hell.

After several years shopping the concept around before getting Todd Rundgren's attention, Bat Out of Hell hit the shelves in 1977. While not immediately a hit, the album grew with popularity over time. It spent 485 weeks on the charts in Britain (second only to Fleetwood Mac's Rumours at 522 weeks), is presently the #5 best-selling album ever released with more than 43 million copies sold worldwide (14 million in the United States alone), and still sells about 200,000 copies per year. A "sequel" album, Bat Out of Hell II: Back into Hell, was released in 1993 with new songs by Steinman, including his only U.S. #1 single, "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)". A third in the series, Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster is Loose, was released in 2006 featuring songs written by him and by Bon Jovi lyricist Desmond Child. This was the first Bat album not produced and written solely by Steinman, although several older songs written or recorded by Steinman beforehand are featured. In addition to the Bat Out of Hell trilogy, Meat Loaf has released several other albums, with varying levels of involvement on Steinman's part.

Meat Loaf's music provides examples of;

Abusive Parents: When he was younger, his father tried to kill him. This is not an exaggeration, his father came at him with a knife. A similar theme emerges in the song Objects In The Rear View Mirror (May Appear Closer Than They Are), in verse 2.

Anti-Love Song: "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad", "Paradise By the Dashboard Lights" and "Not A Dry Eye In The House".

Audience Participation Song: All together now: "You took the words right out of my mouth...oh, it must've been while you were kissing me..." When performing with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, he stopped the show because the singing from the audience was lacklustre, and he said they sounded like they were from Sydney. The audience suddenly got a lot more involved, but exploded when he screamed at the top of his lungs "ARE YOU TOO OLD TO STAND UP?!" During live shows, he has been known to stop the band mid-song and call out a particular audience member who was not singing along.

Author Appeal: Jim Steinman really has a thing for Peter Pan - aside from Bat Out Of Hell itself, references to "lost boys" and never growing up or changing appear throughout his lyrics. Additionally, Meat Loaf's touring band is called "the Neverland Express".

The Band Minus the Face: Jim Steinman's Bad For Good, an album he recorded with Meat Loaf's band after he'd lost his voice.

Call-and-Response Song: "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" and part of "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)".

Call-Back: "Souvenirs" from his 2016 album Braver Than We Are features the line "You been cold to me so long I'm crying icicles instead of tears", one of the most memorable lyrics from "Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad", one of the big hits from Bat Out Of Hell.

The Cameo: Saxophonist Lenny Pickett (best known for his work on Saturday Night Live) performs a riff at the beginning of "Good Girls Go To Heaven."

Happens on several albums; people like Cher, Brian May, Roger Daltrey, Hugh Laurie and Lil John have all turned up.

Canon Discontinuity: Stoney and Meatloaf has been out of print since before the CD era, and is not listed in the discography on Meat Loaf's website.

Concept Album: Hang Cool Teddy Bear, in which every song represents a possible future scenario in the life of a wounded soldier. Meat Loaf has also stated that every song Jim Steinman has ever written is treated as if it is part of the aforementioned, unproduced NeverlandRock Opera.

Cloudcuckoolander: Often comes across as an eccentric character when he gives interviews. However, Meat also said that this was his first impression of Jim Steinman, whom he describes as, "One weird dude."

The Cover Changes the Gender: Jim Steinman wrote "It's All Coming Back To Me Now" for a female vocalist. Meat Loaf's cover redoes it as a duet.

Dirty Old Man: Averted. Because Meat is well over 50, singing "Paradise By The Dashboard Light" to a young woman who looks like she's still in high school brings up all sorts of nasty mental images, so the female vocalist will usually dress up like a frumpy housewife to make the whole thing feel more like a flashback.

Epic Instrumental Opener: "Bat Out Of Hell" and "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)" both go about two minutes before the first vocals are heard.

Epic Rocking: Many of Meat Loaf's songs (particularly those written by Jim Steinman) run considerably longer than the average pop tune and go through two or three major changes in key or tempo before the end. "I'd Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)" is 7:38 in its short version, making it the longest song to ever reach #1 on the US charts. (The album version is an even twelve minutes — Steinman reportedly wept when he was told they'd have to trim it down to get it on the radio. More to the point, Meat Loaf's autobiography describes the original studio version pre-album as fifteen minutes long, needing a shave presumably due to CD space.)

Heavy Mithril: The artwork for the Bat Out of Hell trilogy is provided by fantasy illustrators Richard Corben, Michael Whelan, and Julie Bell, and makes frequent use of giant bats, motorcycle-riding swordsmen, and the like.

Heroic B.S.O.D.: After the original Bat Out of Hell Tour, work on the follow up album was impeded by the theft of Jim Steinman's manuscript, which he apparently took a long time to get over.

Large Ham: His acting roles. His vocal delivery also qualifies. Wikipedia categorizes his vocal range as "Dramatic tenor".

Literal Genie: In "Paradise By the Dashboard Light," the singer swears to love his girl until the end of time. He then prays for the end of time so he can be released from his obligation.

His promise comes off as a But Thou Must!, because his girl presses him really hard for that promise by refusing to have sex unless he makes that promise. Despite his repeated refrain of "Let me sleep on it/Baby, baby, let me sleep on it," she insists that she can wait all night for an answer, and finally, he makes his promise out of insanity following the pressure she applied.

The Musical: Bat out of Hell was expanded and made into a stage musical, essentially a retooling of the original '70s era Neverland concept altered to remove the explicit Peter Pan references, although this basically involved changing the names and not much else) that spent quite a while in Development Hellnote This is excluding the 40+ years the basic framework languished following the end of the 1977 workshop before finally premiering in Manchester in early 2017, transferring to the West End a few months later, and making its North American debut in Toronto. No Broadway transfer has been announced as of yet.

If you haven't heard California Isn't Big Enough yet, you may not expect the start of a slow, calm Double Entendre song to suddenly lose the 'double' part, when the volume kicks up and he belts out "I CAN BARELY FIT MY DICK IN MY PANTS!" Boastful Rap indeed...

From "Who Needs the Young:" "My sex just isn't what it was / Is there anyone left who can FUCK? SCREW 'IM!"

Recycled Soundtrack: "Seize the Night", from Bat Out Of Hell III', features lyrics from the English version of Tanz der Vampire, a string intro borrowed from Steinman's Bad For Good album, and the guitar riff from "Good Girls Go To Heaven (Bad Girls Go Everywhere)."

"Wasted Youth" from Bat Out of Hell II is "Love and Death And An American Guitar" from Steinman's Bad For Good with different background noises.

"Dead Ringer For Love" began life as, of all things, the theme song for the Animal House TV show.

Generally, if Steinman's involved, there will be no small amount of Self-Plagiarism from his previous work.

Rock Opera: "Bat Out of Hell" and "Paradise By the Dashboard Light" both tell a self-contained story. The remainder of the Bat Out Of Hell album, while not operatic in theme, certainly has a Wagnerian vibe to it.

Self-Deprecation: He really doesn't think much of his own songwriting abilities (although the title track on Midnight at the Lost and Found is popular with his fans).

The cover art for Hang Cool Teddy Bear includes the skeletal remains of the swordsman from the cover of Bat Out Of Hell III.

"Shaggy Dog" Story: "Wasted Youth", a spoken word piece on Bat Out of Hell II which parodies "The End" by The Doors and builds up to an epic punchline.

And just as I was about to bring the guitar crashing down upon the center of the bed, my father woke up, screaming "STOP! Wait a minute! Stop it, boy! What do you think you're doing? That's no way to treat an expensive musical instrument!" And I said "GODDAMNIT, daddy! You know I love you... but you've got a HELL of a lot to learn about ROCK AND ROLL!"

The Song Before The Storm: Appropriately, "Stand In The Storm" from Hell In A Handbasket. The next track is, indeed, a lot of thunder and lightning (and titled "Blue Sky").

Spell My Name with an "S": "Meat Loaf" is always two words, always capitalized - not "Meatloaf", not "Meat loaf", not "Loaf." How many times has the media made this mistake? Don't ask. Just don't. And don't call him Marvin...he changed his name. He goes so far as to have himself credited as "Meat Loaf Aday" on the songs he's written.

Hilariously invoked when Christopher Lee introduced him on Saturday Night Live, mis-reading his cue cards; "Ladies and gentlemen, I would like you to meet... Loaf!"

In concert, Meat Loaf introduced a man he claimed to be his brother to perform the spoken word track "Wasted Youth," introducing him as "Tony Loaf".

Spiritual Successor: Hang Cool Teddy Bear aims to be this for the Bat Out of Hell trilogy (the cover art is similar to that of the Bat series, and the back of the album has a big Roman numeral IV on it).

Updated Re-release: The Bat Out Of Hell album has been rereleased on a couple of occasions by adding extra tracks to the end of the album. Dead Ringer For Love was added to earlier versions and a live rendition of Bolero and Bat Out Of Hell were later additions to newer releases.

Villain Song: From Bat Out of Hell III, "In the Land of the Pig, the Butcher is King," which was originally written as a Villain Song sung by the corrupt officials of Gotham City in an abandoned Batman musical. It eventually made an appearance in 2017's Bat out of Hell: The Musical as a villain song for Big Bad Chief of Police Falco and his goons at the top of Act II.

Vocal Evolution: Meat's voice changes noticeably over the course of Bat/Dead Ringer/Lost and Found, becoming less throaty and raw, probably owing to the damage he did to it during the Bat tour.

His voice has also, sadly, been declining steadily since 2005 or so. He still sounds pretty good on Bat 3 and the subsequent studio albums, but it's clear that his range has decreased. On the Melbourne and 3 Bats live albums, he struggles with some of the melodies and is frequently flat.

On Braver Than We Are, his voice is barely there at all; he rasps and growls like Tom Waits at times.

Xtreme Kool Letterz: "Godz" from Braver Than We Are; this quirk seems to have been invented for the album the original Neverland version (from all the way back in the mid '70s) is spelled normally as seen here.

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